(Flickr/iyoupapa)

Sometime around 3:30 this afternoon a man in his 20s or 30s entered the tiger habitat at the Bronx Zoo. At least one of the tigers then did what tigers might do in such a situation.

As of 5 p.m. the man was in critical condition at Jacobi Hospital with severe injuries to his leg. Bronx Zoo director Jim Breheny told the New York Times that emergency response staff quickly jumped in and fended off the tiger with a fire extinguisher. They were able to sequester the tiger and transport the man to the hospital.

The man may have jumped from the monorail in his effort to enter the exhibit.

WABC gives some specific details:

A van traveling southbound on the Bronx River Parkway left the roadway near East 177th Street, fell down a 50-60 foot embankment, overturned, and crashed onto the property of the Bronx Zoo.

As of 2 p.m. southbound lanes are closed on the Bronx River Parkway around Morris Avenue and traffic is being rerouted onto Pelham Parkway.

Now, thanks to the Bronx Zoo, you can name an animal and avoid the hassle involved in actually owning a pet. Reports the Daily News:

Adorable baby lion triplets make their debut Friday at the Wildlife Conservation Society's Bronx Zoo, and the Daily News has an exclusive sneak peak.

Even better - New Yorkers can join in the excitement by helping to name the toothsome threesome.

We suggest "Tim," or maybe "Steve." Aggressively human names for animals are always a great joke, we find.

Tonight begins a three-game series between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, and the News flags Mike Lupica's column as "The big preview." It's a narrative about narrative! "The Red Sox vs. the Yankees is never bad. It wasn't last year even though the Rays beat both of them and the Yankees finally produced a $200 million team that wasn't good enough to make the playoffs. But maybe this season the rivalry goes back to being great again, and the narrative we always want has both of them back at the top of the AL East." But one of the big villains in the piece is the new Yankee Stadium, which he thankfully observes is not where the two teams are facing off tonight: The fact that this is all starting at Fenway guarantees the old story line we all want. What happens when the action moves here? According to Lupica, it means fans catching more fly balls than fielders do.

As long as we've got some Yankees action to flag, the News gives a little box to its reporting on the Mets: "[Jerry] Manuel suggested changes to the rotation could be in the offing after each pitcher is given one more opportunity. A team insider later elaborated that no one, aside from Johan Santana, has immunity."

New York Post: In thi$ economy, even the animal$ are $uffering! Wow, that never gets old. We'll explain in a bit. O.K.! So the Bronx Zoo yesterday informed a committee of the City Council that a budget shortfall was going to force them to close some exhibits and move some animals to other zoos where more people like them. Shakeup in the captive-animal kingdom! The Post decides to characterize these as layoffs: See, that means they can drag a business-reporting conceit all the way through the article! "Economy's so beastly ... BRONX ZOO FIRES ANIMALS!" Of course if everyone getting fired these days were placed in other jobs automatically, where people had money to pay them, instead of being dumped on the street and stripped of the company car lease, then unemployment would not be such a big deal. But these animals (which include deer, bats, porcupines, foxes, lemurs, caimans and antelopes) will all be given new homes where the zoo won't have to come up with $15 million this year to keep them. O.K., besides "beastly" in the headline, there is the lead: "Situation wanted: will work for hay." Oh boy. More: "Wild-fired from the zoo." Huh? Perhaps not the ideal headline as actual wildfires threaten actual human lives in South Carolina. And also! A handy little series of "cover letters" from some of the animals getting the boot. The Arabian Oryx is "the perfect mammal for these terrorist times because it speaks" both Arabic and Hebrew. Chuckle? No, us either. For what it's worth, on Morning Joe this morning, the piece was a big hit with Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, who gamely played along with the Post's "pink slip" conceit.

Spring is sprung, the grass is riz. And the front page is where the sports stories is! A doubleheader (sorry!) at the top of the page flags the section in general: We've got an NFL Draft preview from Steve Serby and a teaser for  pre-game coverage of this weekend's series between the Yanks and the Red Sox. No mention of the Mets' blues. Wait a minute, what's the headline? "Yanks vs. Red Sox: Analysis of this weekend's series." Are we still reading the News? Here's what Mike Vaccaro wrote inside: "Tonight is as good a time as any for Joba Chamberlain to remind everyone who he is, what he is, how important he is to the Yankees and how vital he will be to the next generation of the Yankees-Red Sox rivalry." So why not "JOBA JUICE" for the headline, then "Makes his case in weekend series" or "Yanks vs. Red Sox" or something? It's like somebody hadn't gotten a smoke break in too long and despaired of actually writing the display for this refer.

We're awfully busy at the Post today, because we've talked about three stories and there is still one more left! "State Dems' junket $hock," reads the headline, and the article begins with a jump to the inside explaining a junket that the evil overlord of the Democrat-controlled State Senate is planning even as the local economy tanks. (We always read that "$" substituted for "S," a favorite Post ploy, with a li$p.) The tin-eared majority leader, Malcolm Smith, seemed not to catch a "Rome is burning" reference to his fiddling, and what's worse, he suggested that taxpayer money would fund the trips to Puerto Rico, China and India before backing off and saying attending senators would be paying for themselves. (In which case, we suspect, no junket anymore!)

General observations: Wow, did the Daily News oversell. We're struggling. When what's inside is this far from what's advertised, is there a penalty? We are going to make an argument for "yes." O.K., you've got me to pick up the Daily News  because I think I am going to see pictures of a murderer doing Jell-O shots, and then they are not there. What happens the next time you advertise a GIANT COLLECTION OF SHOCKING PHOTOS INSIDE? All wood is overwritten, all of it is oversell. But it has to be the right level of oversell. If we put this up against the BRONX ZOO story in the Post? Well. Taking a story like this, one of the more mundane effects of the present recessionary economy, and turning it into a conversation piece is one of the great magical powers of the Post. To us, this one fell flat. Do you believe anyone will be standing around saying, "Can you believe the recession has gotten SO BAD that the Bronx Zoo is firing its animals?" Actually, never mind. This morning, Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski did just that when they held this cover up. So let's give the Post this one. But we are handing out a disciplinary notice on the Yankees headline; not that the News did any better.

Also, dear reader, apologies for the lateness this morning.

Winner: New York Post

10:30 a.m. The Quinnipiac University Polling Institute will release results of a poll of New York State voters asking their opinions about Governor Eliot Spitzer and other statewide officials.

11 a.m. The Bronx Zoo will host a blood drive with the New York Blood Center in the Bronx Zoo parking lot on Southern Boulevard and 182nd Street.

11:30 a.m. A groundbreaking will be held for the renovation of the Frederick Douglas Playground at 101st Street and Amsterdam Avenue.

5:30 p.m. New Yorkers for Immigration Control and Enforcement will hold a rally to protest the "slap on the wrist" some students received after disrupting a speech by the founder of the Minuteman Project in October at Columbia University, 2950 Broadway at 116th Street.

6:30 p.m. The Japan Society will host a discussion on Indo-Japan economic relations at the Japan Society, 333 East 47th Street between First and Second avenues.

7 p.m. Congressman Charles Rangel will sign copies of his memoir, "And I Haven't Had a Bad Day Since: From the Streets of Harlem to the Halls of Congress'' at Barnes & Noble at Lincoln Center, 1972 Broadway at 66th Street.

7 p.m. Democracy for NYC will have link-up meetings at Cosi at 2160 Broadway and 76th Street, with host Merle McEldowney and Kettle of Fish, 59 Christopher Street and 7th Avenue, with hosts Dana Northcraft and Abhishek Mistry.

-- Gillian Reagan

HILLY: So George got back from his vacation, and he was really depressed and irritable. And last weekend, we had a little altercation—remember?

GEORGE: About what?

HILLY: When I cried?

GEORGE: About what?

HILLY: We were having a great time Saturday. I rented a bicycle—he already has one—and we rode through Central Park. We rowed on a little boat, and we had a great day and no drinking, right? And then we were back at your house and we started to watch a movie and …. Well, while we were riding bikes, everything seemed perfectly wonderful—and then I would look over, and he would pass me or something, and he would roll his eyes at me and give me this look of … kind of … disgust. And I just let it pass. I thought: Well, maybe he’s just having an irritable moment, or the crowds are bothering him, or the heat, or he was just tired ….

GEORGE: It wasn’t you!

HILLY: Then, later on, we got off the bikes and we were walking them—he was walking a clear 30 feet ahead of me, and I felt like he was doing it on purpose, and he did it for a couple blocks and didn’t turn around. A couple of times he would say something, but I couldn’t hear him because his voice was going this way and I was behind him, and a couple times I said, “What?” And he got really snappy, snippy snappy.

GEORGE: Will you slow down please? O.K. Go on.

HILLY: And then we got back to your house ….

GEORGE: Didn’t we go paddleboating?

HILLY: You were pretty nice on the paddleboats.

GEORGE: That was fun!

HILLY: That was lots of fun. But then later you couldn’t find the remote, and he got really mad and he said, ‘Goddamn it! Why’s this place always got to be such a mess?’ And he had to kind of look down and gather himself, and it made me cry. I was sad that he just felt so bad. And I didn’t want him to see it; it was just a few tears, but then he turned around and he saw, and he got really mad, and he went into the room and shut the door. I think it scares you when I cry.

GEORGE: Right.

HILLY: But then I tried to explain it wasn’t just him, I was having sort of hormonal things and had been kind of sad the past couple days about just whatever. But I felt like I was walking on eggshells—not the whole day, just those moments when he felt really irritable. But then we made up. It wasn’t really a fight. My theory is that ever since he’s been back from vacation, he’s been pretty sad.

GEORGE: O.K. So now I go? O.K., we’ve had some nice times. We went to the Bronx Zoo. We went to this great party, right? Talk about that.

HILLY: That was so much fun. It was this big party on Liberty Island for Imperia vodka. We got to go inside the Statue of Liberty, and it was kind of a private tour.

GEORGE: Right, keep going. That’s it? And you got to meet—

HILLY: I got to meet Duran Duran, which was one of my favorite bands when I was a teenager.

GEORGE: Got your picture taken with Nick Rhodes, and we danced and we were real silly, had a great time, on the ferry?

HILLY: We had so much fun, yes.

GEORGE: And the Bronx Zoo, how was that?

HILLY: It was great—we got up early, and it was incredible, because he had jet lag. It’s nice because we’re on a much similar schedule now.

GEORGE: We went all over the zoo, and what did we see? All the animals, right?

HILLY: Uh-huh. All the animals.

DR. SELMAN: So after whatever happened in the park that day, when you got home, you then cried because you felt bad for George?

HILLY: I felt responsible, like there was something I was doing, or not doing, that made him feel irritable. Like if I had been able to do something better, he wouldn’t maybe feel the need to be so irritable.

GEORGE: So she’s blaming herself. I’ll try to comment on these funks. I happen to kind of be in one right now. I have fantasies about leaving New York. I want to move to London or Rome or Kansas City or just anywhere. Coming back from this vacation paradise, I really felt the contrast. I’m sure it’ll pass, but right now I don’t understand this place, it’s a fight to the death in a hellhole. Just the priorities here. And you know, I’m part of that—I get that. I did a story about 10 years ago about people who’ve been living here a long time and always say they’re getting out—and of course they’re here 10 years later. Now I’m one of these people. Back then, I think I mocked the people I interviewed. I wish I could go back. In the first phase of my “career,” I did a lot of mean stories.

DR. SELMAN: Mean stories?

GEORGE: That was a specialty. I did other kinds of stories, too. And I’ve really stopped doing that, and I think I’ve become much more compassionate. I moved here in 1977—growing up here was one stage. Then I moved back here for good after college in ’91, and since then all I’ve thought about is media, journalism, all thanks to Spy magazine, Tom Wolfe, Hunter S. Thompson, The Observer and all these people. I kind of wish I had a period in my 20’s where I did a year somewhere—you know, Tibet or something. Man in search of himself. Because all I’ve been thinking about is New York media kind of stuff.

DR. SELMAN: Sounds like a lot of negative thinking.

GEORGE: And kind of whiny, too. Yes, we’ve had a great time, those two nights out together. But then there’s always this sort of letdown. Highs and lows.

DR. SELMAN: You have mood swings. Any other symptoms?

GEORGE: Symptoms? I get fixated on this leaving–New York business. Because I know I’m not gonna do it. I’ve never even been to London.

DR. SELMAN: You have anything in the way of anxiety?

GEORGE: No. Actually, this is where things are happening, and this lifestyle is what I’ve always wanted. Get up at noon, get on the e-mail group with my high-school friends—which, aside from being with Hilly, gives me the most pleasure. Didn’t we do something else that was fun recently? We were talking about going to the Philharmonic, because Hilly knows so much about music. She went to music school, played violin and viola.

DR. SELMAN: How is it for you, Hilly, when you cry? What is it that you experience? You said that you felt that George was depressed since he’s gotten back, and irritable. He himself says he’s had mood swings, and he’s back to all these negative thoughts about moving to some other part of the world. How does that impact on you?

HILLY: It’s sadness and fear. Ever since I first met him, he’s been toying with the idea of moving away. At the beginning, honestly, it used to terrify me when he’d say that, because I took him seriously. It seems like you haven’t visited that in a while.

GEORGE: Well, I liked going to the Bronx Zoo. I just sometimes feel like I’ve done it, written about how ridiculous things are here, and I need to go try to crack some other place.

DR. SELMAN: So you’re serious about that?

GEORGE: No, I’m just saying it. Because what’ll happen is, I’ll be walking down the street and I’ll suddenly realize how great this place is.

HILLY: It’s probably a pretty miserable time of year for everyone. Like in February, people feel depressed because it’s been a long winter, and in August, it’s so humid and disgusting and you can’t breathe outside. Right?

GEORGE: Yeah. I called the police on my downstairs neighbors last night, twice—that gave me great pleasure. They were having a party in the backyard, about a dozen of them, barbecuing, laughing. And I shut down their party. They’re illegal subletters. They’re moving out in a couple weeks. I’m probably going to miss them a little. See, that’s negative—that’s negative thinking.

DR. SELMAN: I’m curious. Is Hilly correct when you were biking in Central Park, that you were looking at her in a way that was critical?

HILLY: Disgust?

DR. SELMAN: Was she accurate with that?

GEORGE: No, what was going on is, we went to the Great Lawn and there were 250,000 people there—it was driving me crazy. And we sat down, and there were two guys having the loudest conversation you could possibly imagine. I swear it wasn’t disgust or annoyance with you, it was just an overwhelming—

DR. SELMAN: So she misinterpreted all of that?

GEORGE: The problem is, I couldn’t—I wouldn’t, or I didn’t have the energy to—make her feel good, more comfortable, and make it clear.

DR. SELMAN: So you had a sense that she felt the way she did—in other words, that you were making her feel bad and not saying anything?

GEORGE: No, I could sense that she was trying to perk me up, cheer me up, and I was resisting that. But I think it did pass, once we got in the paddleboat?

HILLY: I think that’s something we talked about before, the sunburn syndrome. If I can sense that you’re in a bad mood, I probably should back off. Because by being perky and trying to cheer you up, that can make you feel even more miserable.

DR. SELMAN: Why do you feel responsible for his behavior?

HILLY: I think that as long as I’m aware that he’s in a bad mood, it’s only common courtesy not to do anything to worsen it.

DR. SELMAN: Yes, but you said that you felt hurt, that it brought you to tears that you couldn’t make it better …. It would be interesting—how do you think it would be different if, let’s say, George didn’t have these moods? Didn’t have mood swings? How would that affect the relationship?

HILLY: I think it would be great!

GEORGE: Right.

DR. SELMAN: Well, in my experience, geographical cures don’t work. But there are medications that people can take to—

GEORGE: This one? [picking up a brochure] Effexor.

DR. SELMAN: That’s one, that’s an antidepressant. There are mood stabilizers.

GEORGE: O.K., let’s try one for a week or two?

DR. SELMAN: The problem with antidepressants is that they usually take a few weeks before they can work. So if you take it for a week or two—

GEORGE: So a month.

HILLY: Can’t you try Prozac?

GEORGE: Ahh! I don’t want to take these things. Hmmm.

HILLY: What about homeopathics, natural remedies?

GEORGE: St. John’s wort?

DR. SELMAN: St. John’s wort does not work, studies have shown. Effexor is a good antidepressant. It might be a reasonable thing to do. Drugs like that tend to work better than Prozac.

GEORGE: But if I start getting in a good mood all the time, does that still count? I mean, you’re taking a drug for it.

DR. SELMAN: So? If you had high blood pressure, would you take medication to lower your blood pressure?

HILLY: When I started taking it, it was the difference—I can imagine when we were sitting there in the park and those two men were talking loudly, in the past that would have brought me to tears, because it would have frustrated me so much. But that day when we were both sitting there listening, I was able to realize that I was still irritated and thought they were absolutely barbaric. But I could kind of separate my emotions from my physical reaction.

GEORGE: That sounds like something conscious, like your outlook on life. You’re saying if I were taking that drug, I would—

HILLY: It doesn’t make you happy; it just keeps you from—

GEORGE: When something like that happens, do you remind yourself that you have this thing in your body, and then it all starts to work? Is it a comforting crutch?

HILLY: In certain situations. For example, when my old boss Theo—the evil one—used to yell at me —

GEORGE: She was horrible.

HILLY: She brought everyone to tears, this crazy witch. Everyone was always amazed at my ability to sit there and just listen to her, and she would be outright insulting to me in front of my colleagues, people I worked with from different companies and magazines. It’s instances like that, where you can contain your physical-emotional reaction, but you can acknowledge these feelings in your brain ….

GEORGE: I remember trying Wellbutrin.

DR. SELMAN: How did you do with that?

GEORGE: It made me too even-keeled. A kind of buzzing inside me, knowing there’s something inside you, working on you. I felt numb. Then I was prescribed Buspar, and that was terrible.

DR. SELMAN: That drug doesn’t get prescribed very much anymore. First of all, it doesn’t work.

GEORGE: It was scary—I thought I would never get myself back to normal.

DR. SELMAN: You might want try a mood stabilizer: no sexual side effects, no weight gain. What happens is, if somebody has a condition called bipolar disorder, which you’ve probably heard of, people with bipolar disorder don’t necessarily do well on antidepressants. And yet if they’re having any kind of symptoms at all, the likelihood is that they’re depressed. I could try you on Effexor ….

GEORGE: You’re not saying I’m bipolar, right?

DR. SELMAN: Well, you know, it’s hard to say. Let me tell you the side effects of Effexor: You feel nauseous, increased sweating, decrease in sexual interest, possibly some weight gain ….

HILLY: It sounds horrible!

DR. SELMAN: These are the same effects you can get from Prozac; you mentioned them yourself.

GEORGE: I think I’d rather be miserable.

[to be continued]

—George Gurley

Sonnet-Letter to Tom Cruise

Dear Tom Cruise: I believe you are in love

with Katie Holmes. Though the whole media

establishment—even The New York Times!—

is arrayed in opposition to you,

I accept your assertion of love.

After all, you are the only expert

on the subject of “Whom does Tom Cruise feel

devotion for?” No one else can know. The

possibility exists that you might

lie, but why should I assume that? You’ve done

no harm to me. In fact, you have brought me

joy in many movies (except for A

Few Good Men (1992), which I

found stilted and preachy). Regards, Sparrow

DR. SELMAN: It’s good to keep our eye on the goal. What do we hope to achieve?

George [to HILLY]: I think that you said that everything’s great 90 percent of the time? But stuff where we have … disagreements—it would just be nice to have a, you know, healthier relationship. Right?

HILLY: Mm-hmm!

DR. SELMAN: Interestingly enough, I don’t recall any specific disagreements that you’ve had. You pretty much agree on most things. There are complaints, but out-and-out disagreements, where one of you says, “Look, I don’t agree with that”—you haven’t said that!

HILLY: Well, I have to say something. There’s one we don’t necessarily agree on: When it comes to making plans of any sort, George really doesn’t like to. He likes to have control of his schedule. A couple of weeks ago, I was making holiday plans for this coming December with my parents. And they asked me on the telephone, “Well, why don’t you bring George?” Because if we book now, we’ll get a better fare. And my response was, “I can’t—he’ll have a coronary.” He doesn’t make plans, plus he hates holidays. So there’s no way I can ask him at least until November. And he doesn’t like to make plans such as, “What are you going to do tomorrow night?”—which is fine, because I like to keep that kind of stuff open, too. But sometimes I think grownups have to learn how to make certain plans for the future.

DR. SELMAN: What you’re saying again is that George is very controlling, and this is a complaint that you have.

HILLY: Only at certain times—for me. I do think that people need to plan for the future, whether it’s going to be on their own or with someone else, and just make plans and decisions in case … I don’t know ….

DR. SELMAN: Well, I think a disagreement would be more in line with, say, George saying, “You know something, I really don’t want to do that. I’d rather go somewhere else entirely.”

HILLY: Mm-hmm.

GEORGE: I complain about how I want to break the routine.

HILLY: Oh, yes—that happened the other night. When you got really, really upset when we tried to watch a couple of different movies? Finally you just screamed and stood up and said, “I’m NOT DOING THIS anymore!” And you walked over to the TV and turned it off and said, “I’m not going to sit around and watch movies!” And then you walked over and hid behind your computer. And I just read for a while and everything was fine.

GEORGE: Yes, I really liked us sitting around reading; that felt different. That was great!

DR. SELMAN: Well, is that a complaint? That he gets like that?

HILLY: Well, I do not like the fact that George gets irritable. I do not like the fact that George gets sad and depressed. Quite frankly, I’m sure that you of all people know it’s depressing to be around depressing people. And I’m already depressed. Everybody out there reading this knows that I take Prozac. And so it’s hard. When I see him depressed, it really starts to bring me down. I just think you have so many wonderful things to not be depressed about. It just seems like a waste of valuable Georgie time.

DR. SELMAN: How do you feel about her saying this?

GEORGE: Uhhh, I’m all right with it. Don’t worry. Can I ask something? The couples that you see … I’m just curious about …. Are they mostly married couples that you see?

DR. SELMAN: What is the relevance?

(GEORGE’s cell phone rings; he doesn’t answer it.)

GEORGE: I’m just wondering—all right, I am changing the subject. But I was just wondering, when you see, let’s say couples who are not married, how many years on average have they been together?

DR. SELMAN: There are all kinds of people.

GEORGE: Do you get couples after one year? Couples therapy after just one year of just going out?

DR. SELMAN: I’ve seen that.

GEORGE: What’s it like if it’s been an average of like three to five years?

DR. SELMAN: It depends on what your goal is. Usually, people who are in new relationships are not in couples therapy …. I think it’s important that we focus on what your goals are here.

HILLY: Are you married?

DR. SELMAN: [Silence] Am I? How is that relevant to this?

HILLY: Just curious.

DR. SELMAN: I’m separated. But I was married for 16 years.

HILLY: Wow.

GEORGE: Is that something that you wouldn’t want me to put in the paper?

DR. SELMAN: Put in whatever you want. If I didn’t want to say it, I wouldn’t say it.

GEORGE: Right, right.

DR. SELMAN: But I know what it’s like to be married. [Turns toward HILLY.] Did you say something?

HILLY: I dunno … I’m just kind of, uh ….

GEORGE: A person I interviewed last night, I mentioned to her that I was doing couples therapy, and she wondered if it was in our nature for men and women to be together for longer than three years. Or to be together without having problems, affairs.

HILLY: Wait, isn’t she from a Muslim background? So she probably has a different perspective on relationships between men and women, I would imagine.

DR. SELMAN: What’s your perspective, Hilly?

HILLY: About Islam?

DR. SELMAN: No. Do you think men and women belong together in a relationship?

HILLY: Absolutely! I look at my parents’ marriage and it’s beautiful. They’ve been married for 35 years, they’re each other’s best friend, but also lead their own lives. I can’t imagine anyone wouldn’t want that. At the same time, I can see how people evolve. And so I would hope that George and I will always be together, but things happen. So you never know if one day … Heidi might come knocking on your door (snickering). I don’t know ….

DR. SELMAN: Heidi being the older woman?

HILLY: No.

DR. SELMAN: Or that other one?

HILLY: Yeah—Heidi’s the 6-year-old from George’s childhood, with the pigtails.

DR. SELMAN: Would you say that one of the goals here would be to maintain the integrity of your relationship?

HILLY: That’s a good way of putting it!

GEORGE: Maintain? What does that mean, to “maintain the integrity of the relationship”?

DR. SELMAN: So that you stay together?

GEORGE: Yeah … yeah.

DR. SELMAN: You both have to add that as a goal. You know, you asked for direction!

GEORGE: Right … right!

DR. SELMAN: I think we can achieve our goals; if we know what they are, we’re much more likely to get there. So if staying together is one of the goals of this treatment, then I think that we should be clear on that.

GEORGE: Has anyone ever come to see you with the intention of breaking up?

DR. SELMAN: Yes.

GEORGE: Really?

DR. SELMAN: Or they don’t know. I’ve heard a lot of stories over the years. But I think it’s helpful if we can at least understand what it is that you guys want out of this. So let me reframe this again: One is to maintain the integrity of the relationship; another is that you want somehow to enhance your communication. And in doing that, I suppose, to be able to be more open with one another as to complaints that you might have with each other.

HILLY: Mm-hmm!

GEORGE: And to sort of take an inventory, talk about our relationship and get feedback—right?

HILLY: Uh-huh!

DR. SELMAN: Feedback from me?

GEORGE: Yeah, your interpretations—yeah!

DR. SELMAN: Well, simple feedback: I would have to say that for you to reduce your level of irritability vis-à-vis Hilly would be one positive step.

HILLY: That would be wonderful.

DR. SELMAN: And to be less controlling.

GEORGE: To kind of chill out?

DR. SELMAN: How about George getting less depressed?

HILLY: That would be … a wonderful gift.

DR. SELMAN: Have you ever considered maybe treating your depression, George?

GEORGE: I tried it once—Wellbutrin for a week—and that just made me feel so numb, and there were no highs. Then the doctor gave me BuSpar, and I felt like aliens had taken over my head. A horrible, nightmarish experience.

HILLY: But you know what a good anti-depressant for you is? Exercise!

GEORGE: Right!

HILLY: And a healthy lifestyle! When he’s healthy and he goes swimming, he’s in a good mood!

DR. SELMAN: There are medications aside from Wellbutrin.

GEORGE: O.K., like what?

DR. SELMAN: You want me to go into that? I do have some psychopharm experience.

GEORGE: I could try something else. What would you recommend?

DR. SELMAN: Try an antidepressant other than Wellbutrin.

GEORGE: Like what?

DR. SELMAN: Effexor?

GEORGE: Do these make you, like, really fat?

DR. SELMAN: People can tend to gain a little weight with that drug, but not a lot. (To HILLY) You’re on Prozac. Does that make you gain much weight?

HILLY: I actually lost weight when I started taking it.

GEORGE: Sex drive?

DR. SELMAN: That could be impacted. That’s probably one of the more common reasons that people don’t want to take that drug, because it can lower your sexual desire and make it harder to have an orgasm. Another common side effect of it is increased sweating. But it is a great anti-depressant.

GEORGE: But I could try it for a couple weeks, right?

DR. SELMAN: You could. I’d be willing to give you some of that.

GEORGE: O.K., ummmmmmmm ….

HILLY: Now is probably not a good time for you to try something like that.

GEORGE: Right. Maybe when I get back from my trip. [Silence] What else is on your mind, Hilly? Sorry.

Dr Selman: [Laughs] Why do you say “sorry”? Look, you said that one of the ways that you can help your relationship is for you to be less depressed and less irritable. And your irritability, short temper, results in depression.

GEORGE: Right.

DR. SELMAN: You even use the word, “depression.”

GEORGE: Right! O.K.—sign me up. I’ll take the stuff as soon as I get back.

DR. SELMAN: As I’ve said also in previous sessions, one can feel irritable, anxious, angry as a result of having a hangover.

GEORGE: Does this stuff help with hangovers? I know that’s the wrong question.

DR. SELMAN: It neither helps nor hinders. The only thing that helps hangovers is to drink less.

GEORGE: But wait—does Prozac ever help with the next day?

HILLY: No, but you know what does happen: You take Prozac, and the alcohol really hits you a lot harder.

GEORGE: In a good way?

HILLY: In a bad way!

DR. SELMAN: I really don’t think that there’s much interaction with the drinking, other than that if you’re a depressed person, alcohol is a depressant and can make you more depressed.

GEORGE: You know, one time—this is going to sound bad, but—I had a psychiatrist. I told him that once in a while, I had to go out, be at parties, cover events. And he prescribed me Vicodin—’cause I told him that I would not drink, that I would just take a Vicodin or two. Do you think that’s irresponsible? It really worked. I’m not asking for some now; I’m just saying that I had that one, one and a half, and I just felt great. And I didn’t become addicted.

DR. SELMAN: What do you think?

GEORGE: Bad idea?

HILLY and GEORGE: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haaaaah ….

GEORGE: But wouldn’t that be better, to take one or two Vicodins rather than to have like seven or eight drinks?

DR. SELMAN: My guess is that you’d have one or two Vicodins and seven or eight drinks.

HILLY and GEORGE: Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha haaaaah ….

DR. SELMAN: Well, there are obvious approaches here in terms of your mood, because you could take an anti-depressant. I don’t want to foist anything on you, really. And you could cut down on drinking. I think both of those things—or even one or the other—would probably make some improvements with some of the kinds of things that Hilly finds problematic as far as impacting adversely on the relationship. Do you agree with that?

HILLY: Yes, but I’m a little concerned about George taking an anti-depressant. I have a feeling it’s going to make him more depressed.

DR. SELMAN: Why?

HILLY: Because he’s been against the idea of anti-depressants since I first met him, as far as I know. And I think that the sexual side-effect thing would be equally as depressing, if that were a side effect. I mean, I think it would be great if it did work. But I don’t know.

DR. SELMAN: Not everyone gets the sexual side effects.

HILLY: Really?

GEORGE: Don’t you think I’ve been going out less?

HILLY: I think we need to, in general, make plans and then stick to them. Last weekend, you got really, really irritable, remember? We sat around and read and stuff, but the plan was to go to the Bronx Zoo, and we never made it there. We have to force ourselves to get up and get dressed and get out into the world.

GEORGE: We should have said no to that dinner at Lotus.

DR. SELMAN: What did that dinner do?

GEORGE: It led to a late night.

DR. SELMAN: It’s almost as if all roads lead to Rome with the drinking.

GEORGE: Oh, I see what you mean.

DR. SELMAN: That seems to be a consistent theme: drink too much, then you can’t go to the Bronx Zoo the next day because you can’t out of bed early enough.

HILLY: I could have gone. I don’t think I ever have a hangover problem.

DR. SELMAN: I think one of the problems is that for you guys to make real progress, there needs to be some kind of behavioral change, and that’s not happening. I don’t know how motivated you are to actually do that.

HILLY: So we have to try it again, make it to the Bronx Zoo.

DR. SELMAN: Yes, you know, keep trying. If at first you don’t succeed …. This is only the what, the fourth session? You certainly have come up with a lot of stuff.

HILLY: So there’s hope for us?

DR. SELMAN: There’s hope. It depends—what are we hoping for?

GEORGE: Have we revealed more than your average couple that comes in?

DR. SELMAN: You guys are fabulous.

HILLY: That’s what we want to hear!

GEORGE: So it’s been harder to get other couples to open up as much, right?

DR. SELMAN: Right! Most couples would never open up.

GEORGE: Really? Is he being serious?

HILLY: He’s being facetious.

[to be continued]

—George Gurley

· Leave a phone message for one of your colleagues. On it, write down the number for the Bronx Zoo. Beneath the number, write the words, "Mr. Lyon called. Please call him back." If all goes according to plan, everyone in your part of the office will be laughing for days. (Note: This prank can be used again, with the phone number for the New York Aquarium substituted for that of the Bronx Zoo, and the name "Mr. Crabbe" in place of "Mr. Lyon.")

· Mug an old lady, just for the Benny Hill –ness of it all. If the police give chase, run into the nearest department store and stand very, very still next to the mannequins. Laugh to yourself as they run past, blowing their whistles and brandishing their nightsticks. Then head straight to Central Park, where a group of young nurses is sure to be having a running race. Join in, zigzagging your way through your fellow contestants.

· Go just outside Henry Miller's Theater on West 43rd Street, where the hit alterna-musical Urinetown is playing, and pee on the sidewalk. Repeat, night after night. Soon enough, the Urinetown players and those who come to see their show will get a big whiff of something that will surely cheer them up. The smell will also gladden the hearts of anyone else who has ever gotten a chuckle out of the title of what is surely an overrated production.

· Invite a group of the city's elite gatekeepers-financiers, media moguls, society dames, etc.-to a private dinner at the ESPN Zone restaurant. Laugh to yourself as they struggle their way through a meal of bacon cheeseburgers, etc.

· Late at night, approach any group of disaffected-seeming street-corner youths, saying, "What are you looking at? Are you looking at me? You better not be looking at me, unless you're wanting an ass-whupping." If they take the bait and get all mad, simply explain to them that you were just kidding. Then step back and enjoy the laughter you will share with them.

· Design a sandwich-board placard with the words "Bloomberg Makes Man-Love With Saddam Hussein. I Have Evidence." Wear it as you stroll back and forth along the steps of City Hall with a dumb grin on your face.

· If you're a white man, say to your girlfriend, "Damn, baby, you look fine." If you're a black man, turn to your girlfriend and say, "I find you to be quite fetching, sweetie."

· If you are called to serve on a jury, keep humming the old Matlock theme in the jurors' room during the deliberations. Vote "guilty" if you think the accused is innocent, and vice versa.

· Go to a dance club, get very drunk, flick your lighter and yell up to the D.J., "Play 'Free Bird,' asswipe! I didn't come here to hear no disco music!"

· Go to Joe's Pub and demand that the proprietors make the beer prices as low as their bar's humble-sounding name would suggest.

· Don't bathe for weeks. In the office, say to your colleagues, "Somethin' stinks around here, and I think it might be me."

· Get yourself invited to a soirée at the home of one of the city's grande dames. In the bathroom, leave copies of various biker and tattoo magazines beside the toilet bowl.

· Spend a day at the Virgin store in Times Square, de-alphabetizing the CD's.

· The next time the Kansas City Royals come to Yankee Stadium, wrangle field-level box seats on the first-base side. Toward the end of the game, run onto the grass and attack the Royals' first-base coach, who was recently assaulted on the field in Chicago. Everyone will begin to wonder, "Why does that guy get beaten up everywhere he goes?" He might even begin to wonder the same thing himself!

· Attach a radio to the handlebars of your bicycle, then ride around searching for one of those charming urban eccentrics who have radios attached to theirs. Then say, "This town ain't big enough for the both of us!"

· Turn to your best friend and say, "If you don't get outta my sight right now, I'm gonna whup your ass." If he or she doesn't leave, let your fists fly and hope for the best.

· Call every newspaper columnist in town. Leave anonymous voice-mail messages saying other columnists have been talking behind their backs.

-Doug Carlton

Cinema (Semi) Paradiso

What kind of a person gives up a portion of their life every year to sit through 27 New York Film Festival selections (most of them foreign) in 17 days? Me: I'm an addict.

I've done it every year for the past seven. There are only a handful of freaks like me: some of them film-festival donors, some of them bona fide filmmakers (like Wes Anderson) and some of them, well, just freaks. Though it sounds like a dilettante's holiday, seeing every movie is harder than it looks; it becomes, in essence, a job. The NYFF order form is a nightmare. I have to concentrate …. The Son (28A) is Saturday, the 28th, at 12 noon or Sunday, the 29th, (29C) at 6:45 p.m. But I already have Ten on Sunday at 4:15 and Unknown Pleasures at 9:30. If I pick The Son for Sunday, then ….

If you see every movie, chances are you're a weirdo about seating. I'm a front-and-center person; I know Wes Anderson has a thing for Row M. He's also unafraid of the occasional "triple." A "triple" is seeing three films in one day. Triples were fine when you were in college nursing a tequila-shot hangover and watched Big , Uncle Buck and Hot Dog in succession while wrapped in a blanket on the couch. But a NYFF triple is like a nine-hour oral exam; it drains your synapses and leaves you bleary. By the end, you practically hallucinate your way out of Alice Tully Hall.

You don't really enjoy the fun parts of the festival, either. This year's opening-night feature was About Schmidt , a film directed by Alexander Payne, the guy who did Election . It starred Jack Nicholson and Kathy Bates, and afterward there was a big party at Tavern on the Green. The stars showed up, and there was an avalanche of food and booze, but I couldn't really go nuts because the next day I had to be up there again for Russian Ark , a 96-minute tour through the Hermitage museum, all shot in one take. Then there was The Magdalene Sisters , a movie about slave-labor laundries run by hostile nuns in 1964 Ireland, and that uplifting piece of work ended at midnight.

Still, I always get into it. For the first three or four days of the NYFF, I'm like a virgin moviegoer: I enjoy every ounce of what's on-screen, no matter what language is being spoken or whose story is being told (and sometimes I don't even know what language it is).

By the end of the first week, however, my husband sees signs of deterioration. My social skills and hygiene start to slip. My friends leave messages that I ignore-after all, I'm in a four-hour Japanese movie with no words. My family says I'm irritable at best. The halfway-through festival "centerpiece" is a huge morale booster, but for every event like Paul Thomas Anderson's Punch-Drunk Love , you'll have to drag yourself to something like Chihwaseon, a South Korean tale about an artist. For the final week of films, I'm pretty miserable. I'm ready for a divorce from my "festival friends"; Wes and I are communicating by nods and grunts. By the time that old festival stalwart, Pedro Almodóvar, shows up on closing night, I'm crashing hard and ready for rehab.

So what do I do the day after the film festival ends … catch up on work and sleep? Hell, no. I gotta get out there and see all the Hollywood crap that I've neglected. That's right: Sweet Home Alabama , here I come.

-Ali Tenenbaum